Photo & Video Galleries

The Hale

Part 1 Project 2015Natalie StasUniversity of Bath Bath UKThe thesis investigates architecture’s role in the public healthcare deficit by addressing the liminal conditions between the hospital andhome, between patients and diagnosis, between communities and their health. Despite positive implications of ‘healthcare for all’, itexplores whether public medical environments are increasingly set against the wellbeing of the patients which they serve. By investigatingthese two diametrically opposed positions, it reveals an in-between state, a new epoch of healthcare architecture to address thisparadigm.

It acknowledges how modern healthcare has become a monument to scientific progress and technological efficiency, failing to recognise its history of civic importance and the role of humanism. What is realised is a healing environment away from models of a socialised machine for medicine, revealing a breed of architectural conditions signifying shifts in attitudes towards social responsibility and autonomy over health.

A prototype scheme is imagined in Weston-super-Mare working alongside an existing public hospital. The design provides a refuge for newly-diagnosed patients and a series of educational and communal public spaces which pivot around a prominent central route. The intent is a new format which acknowledges the autonomy of individuals in healthcare and creation of space which enables individuals and communities to choose health.Natalie StasTutor(s)

2015

The Hale - an architectural response to the public healthcare deficit

A prototype scheme - Weston General Hospital and the community of Weston-super-Mare

Healthcare as transitional space for patients, communities and individuals